February 2026

Wexford Training Newsletter Finding Balance from the Inside Out

Dear Friends,

Sorry so slow on the newsletter this month! Lots happening. I wanted to highlight FREE tickets to the 2026 Art of The Horseman Online Horse Fair are below, under the segment “did you know” and coming up soon on February 21 and 22. Hope you get a chance to see my new presentations this year. Also - at the very end of the usual newsletter - I am adding a new segment called “Accidental Therapy: The Side Effect of Loving Horses” This new segment will be rough drafts for a book I am working on by that title. I am sharing my entire, messy process of writing this book exclusively with you that are on my email list. Hope you like it. Please email me if you want to offer feedback or share any of your own stories!

Enjoy!

Kirsten
​kirsten.wexford@gmail.com

P.S.
​As a subscriber, please feel free to share this or any of my newsletters with other horse lovers! If you have not signed up yet, just click the link to get on the mailing list: https://kirstennelsen.com/#newsletter

Thoughts to Ponder

"It is the harmony of the diverse parts, their symmetry, their happy balance; in a word it is all that introduces order, all that gives unity, that permits us to see clearly
and to comprehend all at once both the ensemble and the details”
- Henri Poincare
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Basic Balance

I use the term Basic Balance as an abbreviation to describe an essential, three dimensional coordination of the physical body, for us and horses, that is simply the healthiest use of the bodies we have, as they are, at any age.

The inherent design of the bones and soft tissues are what actually teach us how the body is meant to organize both stability and mobility. Balancing coordination, or the use of whatever conformation we happen to have, means using the right parts of the body for stability first in order to allow the mobile parts a free range of motion. We cannot change the inherent structure, or conformation, but we can always change how it is organizing, or coordination.

In engineering there is a principle called “form follows function” which means that engineers design mechanical components according to the job they need to perform. With bodies, the forms are already designed, the mechanical pieces are in place. But we are not given an instruction manual on how to best use it. Instead we are all left to figure it out as we go. Developing Basic Balance is a process of learning how to guide habitual use of the mechanical body in accordance with the inherent design, using all the right parts for the intended functions.

People and horses figure out how to maintain stability well enough to not fall over too often. But without help and knowledge, the odds of figuring out the most mechanically efficient use of the body are just not in our favor. When good use of the body is naturally figured out we call that person or horse “talented.” But, with or without athletic talent, we can all benefit from training that helps improve efficient, balanced coordination of the body for all of the jobs that we do.

Basic Balance as a coordination for horses is not well understood or commonly shared in the horse world. We tend to focus on what horses can do much more than how horses are organizing their bodies in order to do something. We forget, because horses are so big, that they have to find stability with our weight as an added factor. What we usually label as behavior, lameness or performance problems are often the result of horses just not knowing how to feel safe, stable or comfortable doing what we are asking them to do.

All horses share the same anatomy that has a specific mechanical design. When we understand how to guide coordination in the direction of Basic Balance, then feeling safe, stable and comfortable in work are the results, with horses willingly cooperating instead of resisting.

If we don’t know or are not willing to learn what a balanced coordination is for horses, then dysfunctional coordination is far more likely and means that small, repetitive stresses and strains will tax the body over time. Some horses feel this before we can see the problem and protect through defensive behavior. Other horses cope as best they can until the mechanical stress transitions into a painful lameness. Either way, poor coordination eventually means we don’t get to keep riding our horse safely.

Coordination in horses, just like people, is observable through postural changes. What is often called poor conformation in horses can just as often be habitually poor posture. While conformation cannot change, posture can change a lot.

How the skeleton is organized creates changes in muscle use throughout the entire body and constantly alters the overall posture that we can observe. Changes in posture also alter the forces of motion we feel during a ride, bumpy or smooth, hard to ride or easy. Through what we see and what we feel we can easily tell if any horse is balanced, has a healthy coordination, or not if we are willing to learn what that really means.

We recognize changes and improvements in coordination as posture, muscle development and movement all improve, and get to reap the rewards of a mutually beneficial partnership with our horse. Changing habits of coordination, developing Basic Balance, in ourself or our horse, mostly requires awareness, understanding and gentle guidance. It is not hard once we know what we are looking for.

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Did You Know? FREE TICKETS

I put together four new videos for The Art of The Horseman Online Horse Fair 2026. They are instructional type presentations about how to calm horses down as needed, finding balance while lunging, finding balance using long reins and how to mount with ease and safety. My little star is a horse at my barn who is an off the track Thoroughbred chestnut mare named Rarely Wrong - and she is still spicy enough to make interesting presentations. In other words, things do not go perfectly.

The first date for the FREE weekend is February 21 and 22, 2026

Here is the link for FREE TICKETS

​http://www.becauseofthehorse.net/a/23333/a2zsSgDH​

Please copy and share the ticket link as much as you like, anywhere!

Art of The Horseman Online Horse Fair

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Upcoming Events View the Calendar

To join a scheduled clinic, please contact the coordinator directly. To book a clinic, please contact me directly at kirsten.wexford@gmail.com

Vero Beach, Florida February 21 Coordinator: Spring 772-538-5208 or springrides@gmail.com

Lake Wales, Florida March 14-15 March 28-29 May 2-3 Coordinator: Nancy 863-528-2570

Baltimore, Maryland April 11-12 June 20-21 August 15-16 October 17-18 Coordinator: Ginny 443-250-8017 or hqueen13@gmail.com

Accidental Therapy The Side Effect of Loving Horses Email Feedback or Stories

Today I am just sharing the idea behind the book.

We all have stories to tell of how the horses we love helped shape us into better people. I learned patience where I once had none. I learned how to self-regulate, not only my actions but my emotional state. In order to be successful with horses we humans have to learn how to override our instincts as much as we ask horses to override their instincts. Reaching our goals with horses simply involves a lot of personal development, usually in ways we did not see coming!

The result of loving horses is self improvement, that I jokingly call accidental therapy because we did not know we were signing up for self improvement until after we fell in love with a horse! But all horses have a way of honing in on our personal weak spots and poking at them until we learn the private lessons being offered. Horses know who we really are even when we are unaware of ourselves. So they show us where we need to grow, shore up our insides, and are pretty relentless until we make a change. Hard truths that we like to avoid come right to the surface with a horse. What we do once things come to the surface is the therapy we did not know we signed up for.

I plan to share my personal stories with horses in this book, and what I learned from different experiences and situations. There is also a standing offer if you would like to contribute any horse stories of your own to become part of this book.

What I share in the newsletter each month will be rough drafts, then edited versions as we go. I would appreciate and welcome any thoughts you have on the rough drafts that can help shape the final book of real-life stories. My motivation behind writing this book is to reach out beyond the horse world and generate more interest in horses, show people just how magical it is to love a horse - and how horses enrich our lives, often with humor and humility.

Email Me